A call to a new Reformation in the teaching and life of Jesus' followers
The killing of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman earlier this year has brought out the usual political punditry. Everyone “knows” the “real” reason Martin took a bullet, even though they can’t seem to agree on what that real reason actually was. As with theology, so with politics: the conclusion to which one comes seems more easily predicted by one’s prior beliefs, than by the facts … Continue reading Trayvon Martin – Race, Guns, or Pride?
The following is a guest post by my father, Aaron Martin, who just returned from a project installing a windmill to bring water to a village of displaced people in Papua New Guinea. For more information about the “Model Village” project in PNG, please see the website of my brother Dave’s company M-CAM. Dad’s account covers a lot of ground. I hope you enjoy it … Continue reading Many cups of water…A Tale from Papua New Guinea
This afternoon as I was driving my son to McDonald’s I turned on one of the local classic rock stations, that was doing a “Retro Weekend.” Of course I’m just old enough to find it weird that the songs they’re classifying as “retro” came out after I was married, but I guess I’m just not young any more…anyway, I got caught short by a song … Continue reading Surprised on the Radio – What if God Was One of Us?
The geniuses of the legislature in my newly-adopted home state are proving their brilliance once again with regard to the Ten Commandments as a source of American law. A bill has just passed our Assembly (unanimously, no less) and is now headed for the Senate, to make sure the “Foundations of American Law and Government” display can be posted, not only in judicial buildings and … Continue reading The Ten Commandments a Source of American Law…REALLY???
In Scot McKnight book The King Jesus Gospel, which I reviewed a little while ago, Scot issued an interesting challenge: “I have always encountered people who boldly announce to me that they are ‘noncredal’ and even say ‘I don’t believe in the creeds’ because of their next words: ‘I believe in the Bible.’ I respond with one question, and I think I ask this question … Continue reading Why I Don’t Accept the Nicene Creed
The concept and ideas around heaven is one of things that has been hijacked and subverted from its original understanding. I once heard N.T Wright eloquently say it like this: “heaven is great but its not the end of the world.” Unfortunately most Christians believe that heaven is simply a destination and that death then heaven is what eternal life means. Of course there is … Continue reading Heaven is not a Destination but a Way of Life
Tom (N.T.) Wright recently gave a lecture at Calvin College that I appreciated very much. In it, he drew attention to an important issue I’ve written about here before: the over-simplification of faithfulness to Christ that takes place when creeds and statements of faith occupy a central position. I know my own position is more extreme than Wright’s…he suggests putting the creeds in their rightful … Continue reading Tom Wright on the Creeds
On Facebook recently I shared an article by Rachel Held Evans on Facebook. It was a great article with a simple desire to point out that asking tough questions about the text is not a slippery slope to faith abandonment. The sharing of this article sparked a dialogue both online and offline with a number of people which got me thinking and led to the … Continue reading I Know What I believe AND I know Why I believe it
On her blog, Rachel Held Evans has just issued a challenge to Christian men, to respond to John Piper’s recent pontifications on God’s having given Christianity “a masculine feel.” I suppose it will come as no surprise to most of my readers that I take neither a conventional “egalitarian” nor “complementarian” approach to the issue. Rachel is absolutely right to call Piper out on this. … Continue reading Of Gender and Leadership
Scot McKnight’s latest book The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited, is a worthwhile read and I commend it to all who believe that the message of Jesus is, can be, or ought to be genuinely “good news.” McKnight has done an excellent job of analyzing what Jesus and the first-century Apostles meant when they spoke of the “gospel” (gospel being derived from … Continue reading The King Jesus Gospel – Book Review